Month: February 2009

A good kind of daily torture…

I have been doing a lot of reading lately, I’m reading my second Don Miller book – “Searching for God knows what” – and a lot of things on the Internet in the same thread as the social justice movement in and out of the church, and those kinds of things.

So now when I ride the train each day I am moved to look at people the way God does – and it humbles me, and tortures me daily.  I’m tortured by the fact that when you think about how God must love the people around you, and you hear, and see how other people treat them, all you can do is begin to imagine how God feels for us.  His love is torturing me, everyday.  I’m okay with this.

I’ve been praying for God to give me his eyes for those around me, and now I see it everyday – and it’s my heart that sees people more clearly each day.  Now I want the words, praying is great, but an encounter with God is better.

Receiving when you can’t give.

Recently Alexis and I have been the recipients of so many gifts from people, many different things, from dinners, furniture, and donations for our trips, to full outfits for Emma, wonderfully framed pictures, and freshly grown vegetables from people’s gardens.  We are so thankful, and we would love to give back in someway, but in most cases we just are not able – and sometimes it gets hard to receive when you are not able to give back in return.  However we are learning that in God’s kingdom there isn’t a balance in this area.  We are told to freely give, so we may freely receieve… sometimes I think our culture twists this and makes us think that means we have to be “fair” in our giving and receiving, making sure that we give back to those that give to us.  When really, to give freely means giving without expecting anything back, at all.  And to freely receieve means exactly that, to receive and not be under pressure to give something in exchange.  For if this is what Jesus wanted we would all be dead.

Still though, it is hard to be in a place where it seems so unbalanced, even harder when it is near strangers giving you things.  It’s humbling, and it’s kingdom like.  We are so thankful to be in a church family that gets this.  We do thank God for all of them every day.  Our appreciation can only be expressed in words and time spent with you all.

Thank you.

Church as Art. Church as Community. Church as Transformation.

Shared by TravisM

What is Church? Check out the whole article here: http://www.theooze.com/articles/article.cfm?id=2198

As we try, together, to imagine and experience what a fresh expression of the church could look like in our context, culture, and community, I believe that metaphors are going to be important. They’ll help us look at things with a sense of focus and clarity without becoming dogmatic or rigid. They’ll create a channel for our little group of friends to flow forward with and push up against. They’ll enable us to hold our ideas loosely and with generosity being lost in a sense of adventure.